


died and gone to heaven

by Stormsong



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angels, Don't copy to another site, Gen, Guardian Angels, Implied/Referenced Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-30
Updated: 2019-11-30
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:08:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21614344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stormsong/pseuds/Stormsong
Summary: Sometimes you need to die to find out what living means. In John's case than means becoming the guardian angel of the world's only consulting detective.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	died and gone to heaven

John was dead.

That's all there was to it.

He was dead. He had to be.

It was the only thing that explained all the white and bright...well, bright everything. Or maybe it was the soft light emitting from every surface that made it all appear bright, because everything was so  _ white _ . The walls, the desk, the chair behind the desk (what John could see of the chair), and the clothes the...bloke was wearing. 

John wasn't so sure the person sitting in the chair was even a bloke. They looked like one though.

Bloke or not they were wearing a white bespoke suit.

The  _ only  _ things not white were the bloke-maybe-not-a-bloke's skin, eyes, and fingernails (John check just to make sure), and John.

John was still wearing the uniform he died in. Or one that looked like it. There was no sand in places there shouldn't be, and maybe most of all, there was no blood...not even a hole where the bullet had struck John.

_ At least nothing hurts anymore _ , John thought idly.

"John Hamish Watson, it is my duty to inform you-"

"You can stop right there," John cut the bloke in white off. "I've already figured out that I'm dead. Just get to the part where you tell me what happens now."

One corner of the man's lips turned up, just a touch. Up until that moment the bloke had the blankest face John had ever seen...well...all his life.

"Since that's the case…then all I need to tell you is that you, Mr. Watson, have been selected to become a Guardian Angel.”

John blinked. “I’m in heaven.” Not that it was a question, but the bloke in white nodded once. “That explains all of the white.”

The man’s lips twitched again and John wondered if the being had ever laughed. If he was even capable of laughing. “Keep that sense of, Mr. Watson, you are going to need it.”

“Is being a Guardian Angel that hard? Not that I understand that part about all of this.” John really didn’t.  _ How did you go from being dead to becoming an angel anyways? _ Not that John had ever thought much about angels before. Though clearly they existed.

“Don’t worry about that, Mr. Watson,” the bloke in white told John. “You’ll be given training, and your duties will be explained.” The man looked down at a file on the desk. 

_ That file hadn’t been there before _ , John was sure of it.

The man looked back up and continued with, “Though with the training you had in life I’m sure you have a better chance at this assignment than any of your predecessors.” __

“Predecessors?” John asked with no small amount of confusion.  _ What in Heaven’s name was this bloke going on about?! _

The man in white either misunderstood John’s confusion or purposefully ignored it. “You’ll do fine, Mr. Watson.”

* * *

John opened his eyes and sat up with a gasp.

At first he thought that everything had been a dream. That he hadn’t died in Afghanistan from a bullet to the chest. (His protective vest had been too big and had shifted.) And that he most certainly hadn’t gone to Heaven, where he had been told that he would become a Guardian Angel.

There was just no way that John could have come up with all of it. Going from being a soul to becoming an angel, getting training on  _ being _ an angel (because of course it's not something that came naturally to anyone);  _ and then _ getting briefed on the person that he was supposed to be a Guardian Angel  _ to _ .

And wasn’t  _ that _ something else altogether. Certainly not something that John could make up! Oh no. Not someone like  _ that _ . Apparently the poor sod had had  _ ten _ guardian angels before John. Ten! Someone had mentioned along the way that John was their last hope to keep the guy alive. That alone did not bode well and was the last shred of proof that John needed that he hadn’t made up any of it. Because John would  _ never _ consider himself anyone’s last line of defense. ...even if he had been quite good at both of his chosen professions. 

If that wasn’t enough proof then the wings at his back was more than enough.

_ Of course, _ John told himself as he levered himself up and out of the bed,  _ that could just be a byproduct of hallucinogenic drugs or a fever dream. _

Though the tingling sensation he felt when he removed his sleep t-shirt to take a shower felt pretty real as the shirt passed through his wings. 

And his bullet wound scar on his shoulder was a freaking  _ scar  _ for crying out loud and  _ in the wrong place! _ Okay, John would give them that one. If someone, for whatever reason, saw John without a shirt there would be far too many questions. First one being how he had survived a bullet to the heart. The answer which was, of course, that John  _ hadn’t _ lived.

John put it all out of mind as he prepared for the day. He had a few things he had to do before he could go find the person he was supposed to guardian angel to. The Powers that Be might have set up all the nitty gritty details, but it was up to John to make the Living believe that he was an invalided army vet recently returned home.

That was one of the biggest differences between John and the ten predecessors. John would be attempting his mission as a corporeal being and would be integrating himself into the life of his charge. Neither of which had been done by any other Guardian Angel before. The Powers of Heaven were just that desperate to let John do things his way.

* * *

With how little John had been told about Sherlock Holmes...and how much John had read between the lines...he honestly hadn’t expecting his first meeting with the man to go so well. 

Though the way Sherlock had taken one look at John and read so much about him…. It was safe to say that John had been just as amazed with Sherlock’s ability as he was with the fact that Sherlock hadn’t been able to tell that John was actually more than he appeared to be. That he hadn’t somehow given away the fact that the limp was manufactured (Heaven’s mistake, not John’s mind creating a psychosomatic limp), or that John  _ technically _ was dead (regardless of the steady pulse).

* * *

As John and Sherlock walked up to the police tape Sherlock asked, “Did I get anything wrong?”

Plenty, but John couldn’t say that out loud; it would give away the fact that the last several months of memories that John had, including those of recovery and rehabilitation, were all artificial. All of which John couldn’t say. What he could say, and did, was, “Harry and me don't get on, never have. Clara and Harry split up three months ago and they're getting a divorce; and Harry is a drinker.”

“Spot on, then. I didn't expect to be right about everything.”

“And Harry's short for Harriet.”

“Harry's your sister.” Sherlock continued to talk to himself about that missed fact right up until they were met at the tape by a woman in a suit.

That was when Sherlock’s entire demeanor turned. John had never seen anyone put up walls so fast. In fact John was almost surprised that they weren’t more than metaphorical.

Then the woman greeted Sherlock with a derisive, “Hello, freak,” and all John wanted to do was put her in her place. Which was not John’s job. John’s job was to prevent Sherlock from dying before his time and preventing unnecessary bodily harm and injuries.

Instead John was forced to watch Sherlock protect himself from barbed comments from two of the Mets “finest”. Not that John blamed Sherlock for flinging out barbed statements of his own, not at all.

Five minutes later John was  _ not _ happy with his charge running off without him. He  _ was, _ however, beginning to appreciate exactly why the ten guardian angels before John had had such a hard time keeping track of Sherlock Holmes. If John hadn’t known any better he would have thought that it was Sherlock who had the wings, not John.

_ Not that they are doing  _ me _ any good right now. Can’t exactly use them where so many people could see me. _

John limped along, not paying much attention to anything, until a phones in the business he was passing began to ring. One store after another. Then, while he watched, a phone was picked up only to be put back down in confusion. 

Then the pay phone a few feet away rang.

It did not take a genius consulting detective to figure out that the ringing phone was for John. 

It was rather creepy, John decided, and that was with knowing that there things out there that he never before considered being real. Like angels, for example.

Creepy or not John answered the phone.

John also decided that if whoever had the power to track John via ringing phones best be dealt with sooner than later; and that if said being prevented John from guarding his charge… then, well, John did have a few angelic powers that simply begging to be tested.

* * *

Fortunately for the man in the bespoke suit leaning on an umbrella in the empty warehouse (or perhaps factory - John wasn’t entirely sure) John didn’t find cause to exercise any of his new angelic powers. No matter how intimidating the taller man was trying to be.

“You don't seem very afraid,” mystery man observed.

_ Not of you _ , John wanted to say. Not when John had  _ died _ , gone to Heaven, and then was told and became a Guardian Angel with all that entailed, before being sent back to Earth. For all that John knew he was indestructible and had nothing to fear.  _ Of course, _ John realized just then,  _ I don’t know if demons are real and no one's bothered to fill in that little tidbit. _

What John did reply was its own truth (angels and demons aside). “You don't seem very frightening.”

Much later, a span of time that would feel longer than it was in reality, John would be frightened, but not for his own being. It would be then, and only then that John would realize exactly why Sherlock Holmes had had ten guardian angels before John had been chosen to fill the role.

It was there in the empty warehouse-maybe-factory, and later while running over rooftops, and giggling in the entryway of 221 Baker Street that John would realize that life as Sherlock’s guardian angel would not be boring.

It would be a table at Angelo’s, and during a fake drugs bust, and giggling at a crime scene that John would realize that he had to die to find out what it meant to live.

It would be as John shot the cabbie serial killer that he preyed to a God he still wasn’t entirely convinced existed that he would be the last Guardian Angel that Sherlock Holmes would ever need.

**Author's Note:**

> I miiiiiight write more of this verse. No guarantees.


End file.
